Kinge Okauchi: 1924-2017

Friday

Oct 6, 2017 at 12:01 AM

Kinge Okauchi passed away peacefully at his home in Inyokern on Sept. 26, 2017, after a long illness. He was 93.

A Celebration of Life will be held at 11 a.m. on Oct. 27 at Holland & Lyons Mortuary chapel. Cremation will be private. In lieu of flowers, donations may be made to the Topaz Museum in Delta, Utah. (www.topazmuseum.org)

He was born May 20, 1924, in Sacramento, California, to Saki Ogawa and Mitsuyuki Okauchi. Both his parents were born in Japan, emigrated to the U.S. and met and married here in this country. His father emigrated in 1905 and was in San Francisco when the devastating 1906 earthquake happened. He lost all his personal belongings, including his documentation. Saki was an accomplished musician, playing the shamisen. Kinge attended public schools.

The family moved from Sacramento to Santa Rosa, and later to Menlo Park.

Saki passed away in 1941, and, according to Japanese tradition, her ashes were kept at home for a time, awaiting later burial.

Then World War II broke out. At the time, Kinge was 17 and in his first semester at San Jose State University. Anti-Japanese sentiment was gathering steam. The authorities would not allow him to board the train to get to college, so he did not register for the second semester.

Then all Japanese persons were ordered to be sent to internment camps for the duration of the war. Most lost nearly everything they owned. In 1942, Kinge and Mitsuyuki, carrying Saki’s ashes, were sent to Tanforan, a racetrack converted into a temporary camp, where they slept in horse stalls. Later they were shipped by train to Topaz Internment Camp, near Delta, Utah. The facilities were rows of barracks, with tar paper on the outside, like those at Manzanar. The Okauchis were assigned a room “about the size of a bathroom,” he remembered.

While there, Kinge was assigned to the boys’ recreation department, supervised baseball games, and was Scout Master of a Boy Scout troop. He remembered enjoying working with the kids, and having to eat beets too often in the mess hall.

His father used the time to craft a butsudan, a model of a Buddhist shrine, to house Saki’s ashes. Created from small pieces of material that he collected, the butsudan was intricate and beautiful.

After the war, Kinge and his father went back to Menlo Park and started putting the pieces of their lives back together. Kinge re-enrolled in SJSUand picked up where he left off. In 1949, he transferred to Stanford University’s Upper Division, earning his Bachelor of Science degree and then his Master’s degree in Aeronautical Engineering. He was offered employment at several facilities, and accepted the offer from what was then known as Naval Ordnance Test Station China Lake.

On Oct. 23, 1950, he arrived at NOTS, along with Bud Sewell, John DiPol and Robert “Bob” Stirton. All four were hired the same day, and worked in related programs for many years. Today, Bud Sewell is the last surviving member of the group. In 2013, the American Institute of Aeronautics and Astronautics honored Kinge for some 60 years of membership.

Kinge worked for the next 30 years in the Ballistics Division of the Research Department, Aeronautics Branch, at Michelson Lab, retiring in 1980.

After his father passed away in 1966, Kinge had his ashes, along with Saki’s, buried together at El Cerrito Cemetery.

He built his home between Ridgecrest and Inyokern, living there until his death. Among his many interests were amateur radio, computers, model railroading, and flying his maroon and tan Cessna 180 out of Inyokern Airport. In 2013, he realized he wasn’t going to fly any more, so he sold his plane and used the funds to have a solar installation put up at his home. He enjoyed going “off the grid.”

He was part of a bagpipe group on base, a member and past treasurer of the IWV Concert Association, lifetime member of the National Rifle Association, alumnus of Stanford and Sigma Xi fraternity, was involved with the China Lake Naval Museum, and 60-plus year member of the China Lake Section of the A.I.A.A.

Kinge met his best friend and partner, Carol Schneider, in the early 2000s. Together, they enjoyed going to plays and concerts, eating out with friends, traveling, and going to museums. In 2015, the pair traveled to Topaz to donate the butsudan his father built to the Topaz Museum. Later they gave a presentation about that trip for the Historical Society of the Upper Mojave Desert.

See pilgrimage.dalatest.com for the story. He also participated in a visual history interview at Manzanar for the Densho project.

Carol’s favorite memories of Kinge are of trips they took together, especially flying around in his plane. “I always loved flying with Kinge,” she said. She was his caretaker in his final years.

He was preceded in death by his parents, aunts, uncles and most of his cousins.

In addition to Carol, Kinge is survived by cousins Terry Furuya and Alyce Furuya, both of El Cerrito, and many friends.

“He has been such a stalwart person all the way through,” said Bud Sewell.

He was a quiet, dignified man who always seemed at peace with the world. He will be missed.